I love Photoshop... But along came LightRoom...Which one now??

[Eyad]

Hi,

I've been learning photoshop shortcuts, actions, layers....etc for sometime now and I love this thing!

Nowadays I find a growing tutorials about LR and how important it is for photographers.

There is also a LR workshop happening next to me in next week... Do you think it's the "Must Have" tool for photographers?

What makes it so special that it's community of users is growing? Are you replacing your PS workflow with LR now?

I'm confused please advise

[OsmosisStudios]

I cant stand the way LR organizes things, and I prefer being able to open a RAW file, do my editing, and have it immediately in PS for my other touchups.

[Sime]

LR isn't PS

LR is a workflow / processing tool - it's not for large edits etc. It's great for keywording and managing whilst PhotoShop is great for editing.

I use them both together, you can export from LR to PS, edit and save at which point your photo goes back into LR.

If you shoot in RAW and want something to manage and develop your images, LR is great.

Does that help at all?

Sime

[Sime]

Originally Posted by OsmosisStudios

I prefer being able to open a RAW file, do my editing, and have it immediately in PS for my other touchups.

What do you mean?

[Eyad]

Originally Posted by Sime™

LR isn't PS

LR is a workflow / processing tool - it's not for large edits etc. It's great for keywording and managing whilst PhotoShop is great for editing.

I use them both together, you can export from LR to PS, edit and save at which point your photo goes back into LR.

If you shoot in RAW and want something to manage and develop your images, LR is great.

Does that help at all?

Sime

So it competes with Adobe Bridge? I use that one for workflow/ keywords and labeling.

[Sime]

I guess you could say it's like bridge but on heavy steroids.

It does loads more.

Some light reading for you from Scott...

Scott Kelby's Photoshop Insider Blog » Photoshop & Digital Photography Techniques, Tutorials, Books, Reviews & More » Blog Archive » Camera Raw, Bridge, or Lightroom?

[Samanax]

Originally Posted by Eyad

So it competes with Adobe Bridge?

Lightroom is like having Bridge and ACR in one program. With Lightroom you can organize through the Library (similar to Bridge) and do your initial adjustments in Develop (similar to ACR) and then send the image over to Photoshop if it needs more extensive edits and adjustments. I use both in my own workflow.

[kirbinster]

Originally Posted by Samanax

Lightroom is like having Bridge and ACR in one program. With Lightroom you can organize through the Library (similar to Bridge) and do your initial adjustments in Develop (similar to ACR) and then send the image over to Photoshop if it needs more extensive edits and adjustments. I use both in my own workflow.

That is a good general assesment, but lightroom has many other features in adition to those. It handles printing and has a web feature as well. Not even sure what additional features are being added in version three which is in beta.

Bottom line, many use Lightroom as their digital assetmanagement tool, do general edits in it, and then only go to photoshop for bitlevel adjustments and only when and if needed.

[Eyad]

Right... That explains it!

I guess I'll give it a try and see how can I use it for workflow management.

Thanks for all who replied and advised on this subject

[OsmosisStudios]

Originally Posted by Sime™

What do you mean?

With CS4 and ACR5.6, I can open a RAW file and immediately go into PS once I've done my original edits.